John McLaren and pitching coach Mel Stottlemyre have some tough decisions to make in the coming days.

John McLaren's face had a worn and tired look this morning. It's clear that the roster decisions he has to make in the coming week are weighing heavily on his and his staff's minds. But then, so are the other issues: lack of situational hitting, injuries and the high expectations for this team.

The first question will be whether he goes with an 11-man or 12-man pitching staff. And there are plenty of variables in making that decision.

"We know what we’ve got in our starting pitching," he said. "We want to see what we’ve got in the bullpen - the three rehab guys, how Morrow is. It all plays into the equation."

And the equation can't really be solved until the factors of the equation are in place... meaning Brandon Morrow, Chris Reitsma, Mark Lowe and Arthur Rhodes have to go from rehabbing to reliable.

"There’s still a lot of competition in the bullpen," McLaren said. "There’s a lot of thought over what we need to do there. There’s the rehab guys, Morrow, who can do what, who can’t do what. We’re going to have to sort this out a little at a time and see where we are. We don’t want to paint ourselves into a corner with innings available in the bullpen. We’ve got to look at the big picture and see what we’ve got to do to protect ourselves."

Morrow is scheduled to throw in a game Sunday. He isn't on the list of pitchers going to Tempe to play the Angels, so most likely he'll join Carlos Silva in the minor league games in Peoria.

But McLaren made it clear they aren't going to rush Morrow back just to make the regular season. They want to err on the side of caution.

"We’re looking for opening day, but you’ve got to look at the big picture. We certainly don’t want to rush anybody just to come out March 31," McLaren said. "If he breaks down Week 1 or Week 2, we haven’t accomplished one thing. We haven’t accomplished anything as an organization and it sure isn’t helping our players. That’s a definite consideration."

And all this needs to be sorted out in the next five days, because McLaren hopes to have the roster in place before leaving for the San Francisco-Las Vegas road trip. But of course he knows that isn't a guarantee.

"I don’t know what we can do over the weekend that we won’t know by the middle of the week," McLaren said. "I just don’t know what a weekend series in Vegas playing the slot machines will do for us. We should know when we hit that plane exactly where we are."

But then he dropped in this nugget that raised a few eyebrows....

"Unless there’s something going on with one of these guys - Dickey, the Rule 5 guy, if we’ve got a deal going for one of our guys who’s out of options," he said. "That may push us back, but I’d like to be set when we hit that plane. I don’t know that we can do that, but that would be my goal."

Hmmmmm..... a DEAL? Maybe the competition for the last few bench spots might have a new player in the mix. GM Bill Bavasi hasn't been shy about late add ons from the waiver wire – think Jason Ellison from last season, or possibly a trade. For the record, the players who are out of options are: Mike Morse, Charlton Jimerson and Cha Seung Baek.